Bondar Kateryna, Paustovska Nadiia and Hasenko Petro

Nadiia Paustovska lived in Simferopol. In a month after the capture of the Crimean Peninsula by German troops, in November 1941, she was approached for help by a Jewish acquaintance, Ida Muherman. Ida had a four-year-old daughter Larysa, as well as a sister Raia with a baby son Tolia. Together they tried to get out of the occupied city, and Nadiia tried to help. She gave Ida her passport and told her to go to the state farm named after Frunze in Saki district, where the staff was required. Ida replaced Nadiia's photo with her own in her passport, refreshed the seal, corrected her year of birth (because she was younger), and changed her last name to “Taustovska”. Having this document, the woman arrived with her daughter to the state farm. Raia, Ida's sister, found refuge in a nearby village. A young peasant woman, Kateryna Bondar, who lived with her young daughter, took care of Ida at the state farm. Feeling the kindness and decency of the hostess, Ida confessed to her that she and her daughter were Jewish. However, Kateryna not only didn't change her attitude towards her roommate but also tried to dispel the suspicions of her fellow villagers about her nationality. However, one day “Nadiia Taustovska” and her daughter were summoned for questioning by the police. After their detention, they were not released, but sent to the state farm “Chervonyi”, to a camp for suspects – to find out who they were. Coincidentally, Kateryna's husband, Petro Hasenko, also found himself there. At the beginning of the war he was encircled and taken as a prisoner, and when he tried to escape, he was arrested.

Kateryna received information about her husband's whereabouts in July 1942 and immediately went to the state farm “Chervonyi”. She decided to release him for a bribe. Staring through the barbed wire, looking for Petro among the prisoners, Kateryna suddenly noticed Ida and Larysa. She called for Ida to the gates of the camp using gestures. Having given a bribe, Kateryna freed them with her husband. In the state farm named after Frunze Ida lived with the child without hiding, because the mayor assured all informers that “Taustovska's” identity had been established and the suspicions removed. Ida continued to work on the state farm, and Kateryna took care of Larysa.

In the late summer of 1942, Petro went in search of information about the fate of Raia. And he returned with the sad news: she had been killed. However, he had little Tolia in his arms, who was rescued by the villagers. Before the expulsion of the Nazis from the Crimea, the boy lived with Petro and Kateryna. They did not tell anyone about him. With the return of the Red Army, Petro was mobilized again, in 1944 he killed. Returning to Simferopol, Ida adopted and brought up Tolia.

All her life she maintained a warm relationship with Kateryna Bondar. Her daughter Larysa Horianska emigrated to Israel in 1990s.

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On March 27, 2000, Nadiia Paustovska and Kateryna Bondar were awarded the title of “Righteous Among the Nations”. And on October 31, 2002 – Petro Hasenko.